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Written question asked by Alicia Kearns (Conservative) on Monday, 6 January 2025, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 9 January 2025 (named day). It was answered by Andrew Gwynne (Labour) on Thursday, 9 January 2025 on behalf of the Department of Health and Social Care.

Viral Diseases

Question

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many cases of human metapneumovirus have been identified in the UK.

Answer

The UK Health Security Agency’s long-term surveillance of human metapneumovirus (hMPV) in England, through systems covering general practice surgeries and hospital laboratories, indicates that hMPV levels in winter 2024-25 are in line with what we would expect to see at this time of year.

Healthcare data for hMPV and other respiratory viruses comes from the sentinel surveillance system, a data collection method used to monitor trends. This means it is not a count of every person being treated for the respiratory virus in hospital. Total case numbers are therefore not held centrally.

Further information on data collection is available at the following link:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sources-of-surveillance-data-for-influenza-covid-19-and-other-respiratory-viruses

Secondary information

Type
Written question
Reference
22090
Session
2024-26
Subjects
Viral diseases
Contains statistics
Yes
Link
View this Written question on www.parliament.uk